


Stroke

by Ephemera_pop (Alex_Draven)



Category: Popslash
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Working stiffs, M/M, Massage, Temptation resisted
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2006-10-15
Updated: 2006-10-15
Packaged: 2018-10-17 00:08:14
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,214
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10582311
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Alex_Draven/pseuds/Ephemera_pop
Summary: "Dude, this is dumb – you know where I live. You helped me move in!""Justin, that's not the point. Just – fill out the damn form, okay?""Hey, chill. I'm the one doing you the favour, remember?""I know, but… Look, I have to do these case studies like they're real clients, right? I'm going to lose marks if you don't write out all this stuff."Justin raised his hands in an 'okay, okay' gesture, and bent his head over the clipboard. JC took a deep breath and counted it out, imagining all his anxiety flowing out along with the carbon dioxide. It had taken him until nearly 3am to re-arrange the furniture in his shoe-box apartment to make space to set up the couch, and he hadn't slept well. He should never have left his case studies so late in the semester.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Written for [this fic_requests request](http://community.livejournal.com/fic_requests/149650.html).  
>  Many thanks to Beta Team Alpha, who patiently enable my complete inability to write _ficlets_ : all remaining mistakes are my own sweet fault.

"Dude, this is dumb – you know where I live. You helped me move in!"

"Justin, that's not the point. Just – fill out the damn form, okay?"

"Hey, chill. I'm the one doing you the favour, remember?"

"I know, but… Look, I have to do these case studies like they're real clients, right? I'm going to lose marks if you don't write out all this stuff."

Justin raised his hands in an 'okay, okay' gesture, and bent his head over the clipboard. JC took a deep breath and counted it out, imagining all his anxiety flowing out along with the carbon dioxide. It had taken him until nearly 3am to re-arrange the furniture in his shoe-box apartment to make space to set up the couch, and he hadn't slept well. He should never have left his case studies so late in the semester.

"Here you go."

Justin interrupted JC's train of thought, but when he looked down, Justin had filled out the consultation form in his big, bold, sloppy, handwriting. He already knew Justin was an over-active, perfectionist control-freak who needed to relax, but it was good to know that that fitted on the form, where JC's tutor would be able to see it in blue on white.

"Okay," JC said, mostly to himself, and imagined himself in a spacious, warm treatment room, with a nervous first-time client he hadn't known since high school. "So you're looking for a relaxing treatment?" He made it a question with a gentle upwards inflection, and Justin nodded. "And you've never had a professional massage before?"

"Nope."

"Okay, well, let me tell you what we're going to do."

They'd had to practise this spiel in class. Literally. Write a script and recite it in front of everyone. Some of the girls in his class had been really scared of the talking in public thing, but JC wasn't worried about writing and reciting – it was screwing up the massage that freaked him out. He'd only done the routine on other people in his class so far, and they were all girls. Of course, he'd used his hands on plenty of guys, but that was a totally different thing.

Justin said he understood, and JC went to stand in the hallway – he figured the hallway would be less weird than locking himself in the bathroom – while Justin got undressed and arranged under the towels on the couch.

"Good morning, Joshua."

"Good morning, Mrs Marshal."

She stopped on the landing. "Is your boyfriend here?"

"Um." JC tried to pull himself together. "I -- no, he's at work."

"Well, when you see him, could you ask him please not to leave his car in my space in the lot? Yesterday my sister came by and she couldn't find anywhere to park."

"I will, I promise. I'm sorry."

"Thank you."

JC made a mental note that for future case studies maybe he should go and stand in the bathroom, after all, so he wasn't out on the stairs trying not to think about guys who were not his boyfriend getting undressed where people could see him looking like a spazz as they came up and down.

"JC!" Justin called, and JC screwed up his eyes, took another deep breath, and let himself back in to the apartment.

And there was Justin, stretched out on JC's massage couch, with his feet sticking off the end, head pillowed on his folded arms, smiling a little Justin smile.

"Am I lying the right way?"

"So long as you're comfortable." JC slid the rolled-up towel under Justin's shins back a few inches, so his knees were at a better angle, and managed to rest his hand flat on Justin's towel-covered shoulder blade without letting any of the freak make its way to the surface. "Or, you can put your arms down beside you, and your face in this thing, if you want. There's a hole under the towel." JC's other hand was resting on the padded hoop at the end of the table, and Justin's shaved head brushed against it as he rearranged himself.

"Oh – yeah – this is better."

"Are you warm enough?" JC stuck to the script.

"Mmhm."

"Alright. I'm just going to clean off your feet, and then I'll begin. And remember, any time something doesn't feel good, you say, right away, yes?"

"Yep."

There was nothing else to do now, but to pull out one of his college-mandated antiseptic sheets and stroke it over Justin's long, fine-boned foot. And that was, honestly, so odd, JC wasn't sure how he'd manage the rest.

He thought his hands were probably shaking as he folded the lower towel, revealing Justin's muscled calves. Lots of oil if the client has body hair, JC reminded himself, hearing it in his instructor's voice, and then swallowing hard, because, damnit, this was a massage, a purely professional thing. This was _school work_ and yet, somehow, it involved oil and skin and his straight best friend. How did he let himself get into these situations?

"You okay?" Justin asked, and JC used the shock to make himself cup his hands over Justin's calves, smoothing the oil downwards in gentle, connecting strokes.

"Yup, just warming the oil up a bit. It's okay, right?"

"It's good."

And then they were silent, JC concentrating on the routine he'd been taught, mapping the movements to Justin's longer, masculine frame, letting his hands tell him where the muscles were bunched and tight. Justin was quiet too – the occasional catch or release in his breathing the only sign that he was aware of what was going on. He moaned when JC's thumbs eased alongside the tendons of Justin's knees, and JC repeated the smoothing circles, which prompted Justin to mumble a thick-sounding 'good'. Too much running around on a hard court, in JC's opinion, but you couldn't tell Justin that.

He'd almost forgotten that he'd been nervous about this, carried along by the repetitive routine movements. But when he'd gotten Justin's legs tucked back in beneath the towel-origami the college insisted was necessary, JC was faced with the long, smooth expanse of Justin's bare back. His narrow waist and broad shoulders, his freckles, and fading tan, golden under JC's hands, burnished with the sweep of oil carried on his fingers. JC pressed his crotch against the edge of the couch, trying not to let any of his sudden tension transmit itself into his hands. Fuck. The cushioned side was just pressure, not sharp enough to force his cock to shut up and go away, and JC was painfully aware of himself.

Justin sighed and moved his shoulder slightly, wriggling and relaxing into the couch. The satisfied, happy sound really didn't help. JC was leaning over him, biting his lip and desperately trying to focus on the effleurage pattern and not to think of other activities that would put them in this position. On the way out of the door to work that morning JC's boyfriend had joked that he wouldn't mind staying to watch JC with his hands all over Justin, and remembering that really, really didn't help either.

Instead he tried to keep his mind on the slow, smooth slide of his hands over Justin's skin, the way the skin was starting to pink a little as the friction of skin over skin over muscles opened up the capillaries and let the blood rise to the surface, feeling with the palms of his hands the sharp rise of Justin's shoulder blades, tracing the cords of muscle either side of his spine with careful thumbs.

Kneading - petrissage JC reminded himself of the exam terminology – across Justin's tense shoulders made Justin sigh again, but JC bit his lip and tried to see if he could feel the difference between Justin's right and left side by touch alone, working extra figure-of-eight strokes on the right side when he could. He daisy-chained around Justin's scapula, leaving rosy spots where his thumbs had worked in tight circles, easing the muscles, and when it was time to use tapotement JC was able to grin when Justin started laughing. The way you knew you were doing it right was when the sound of your cupped hands smacking lightly up and down the side of the body sounded – well – really silly.

Smoothing the final strokes over the full length of Justin's back, JC had almost managed to forget about the heaviness of his cock, the low buzz of arousal, and it took him by surprise when his voice caught in his throat. He coughed, and then he was surprised by how normal his voice sounded when he did get it out, explaining to Justin how he was going to hold the far side of the towel up so that Justin could roll over without compromising his modesty.

He picked up the crease of the towel, and held it decorously, looking away into the middle distance, just like he'd been taught, and the table rocked slightly as Justin shifted and turned.

"You okay?" JC asked, letting the towel drop, and looking up the table to Justin's face.

"Mmmhmm," Justin mumbled, and JC's stomach took a sudden dip as he recognised the bright flush of embarrassment across Justin's cheekbones, and in the same moment registered the substantial bulge in the towel at Justin's crotch.

"Oh, um." He swallowed. "It's, um, perfectly normal, just, um. Would you like a glass of water, I can …"

"Yes. Please."

JC fled, and rinsed his hands in cold water while forcing his hips against the sharp edge of the sink. The water was cool against the hot blood in his wrists, and it helped some. He pressed one damp hand to his throat, the back of it against each cheek in turn, trying to stop them burning before he filled the glass and had to turn around.

When he did, Justin was propped up on one arm, top leg bent, waiting to meet his eye with that little half smile.

"Hey."

"Hi," JC replied, feeling his face heat up again.

"I'm sorry. It's just, you know, it's meant to feel good, right?"

JC's apartment was so small, it only took a few steps for him to get close enough to hand over the glass of water, awkwardly conscious of when their fingers touched. The oil on his hands had left smudges on the glass, but Justin was drinking out of it anyway.

"It happens," JC blurted out. "We, um, we cover what to do in class."

Justin smiled around the glass, and obviously that had been the right thing to say, because there was no trace of shame in Justin's voice when he started teasing that the girls in JC's class must have had plenty of opportunities to practise coping with rogue hard-ons with JC as their practise person.

JC almost tripped over his own feet whilst returning the glass to the counter, when he realised that, logically, that meant Justin noticed that JC got hard a lot. Which, logically, meant that Justin looked at JC's crotch…

Fortunately, Justin didn't ask why JC was blushing again, just settled himself back down, with the towel arranged demurely over his chest, and smiled up at his _friend_ and said something like 'it's not like you've never seen an erection before' and 'you're hardly about to jump me'. JC forced a smile and told Justin to just lie back and shut up so they could get on with the massage.

Jesus.

Trying to remember the names of all the millions of bones and joints in the feet and ankles was a semi-successful coping mechanism, though, and by the time JC was squeezing his fingers around Justin's skinny ankles, carefully applying pressure to either side of the tendon, he was no longer in danger of coming in his jeans. It was a close-run thing, though.

His brain shut down in self defence – or possibly from lack of blood flow – when JC had to fold the towel higher still, and slide his hands up Justin's quadriceps, and from there on it was just instinct and habit that kept his hands in motion, and the thought that it would be unforgivable that kept him from sliding his hands up _higher_.

The whole of the rest of the massage passed in a blur, as JC tried to find a balance between recording every single sensation and hanging on to the last shreds of his self control. Every curve of muscle and line of bone, the way Justin's stomach fluttered under JC's palm, the spring of his ribcage, the way his skin glowed with the oil. Every second was delicious torment, and not even the facial massage, all tiny movements and delicate finger tips, eased the tension in JC's stomach. Justin's trust, and his full lips, and his breath blowing over JC's wrist were just as erotic.

As he stood, warm hands cupping Justin's shaved scalp, JC closed his eyes and took a couple of deep breaths himself.

"Okay. We're done." He forced himself to speak with the low, calming tone they'd been instructed in. "You lie here for a moment. I'll get you a glass of water, and then leave you to get up, slowly, okay? Just take your time, and…"

"Mmmm. I don't think I wanna move for, like, a million years." Justin was smiling, with his eyes closed.

JC kicked himself in the ankle, and then limped to the kitchenette, where he washed his hands about three times over, before finally refilling the glass.

Outside on the stairs, JC made sure his shirt was hanging down in front, and leant against the cool paintwork, gently banging his forehead against the wall. Yes, he wanted to pass the course, and yes he needed case studies, but this had been such a stupid idea. Even through the grain and grit of the old paintwork, JC could still feel Justin's skin giving under his skin, and when he closed his eyes, he saw Justin laid out in front of him, relaxed and at ease, beautiful erection tenting the towels.

JC stared at the magnolia paint and tried to count the brush strokes.

Then he turned around, shoulders to the wall, hands trapped behind his back, and counted the stairs above him, and tried to ignore the vibrating light of the dodgy fluorescents, which were always on, even when daylight was streaming in the skylight, as it was now.

His apartment door cracked open, and Justin peered out, and JC still wasn't ready.

"All done."

Justin was fully dressed, with his bag hitched over his shoulder.

"Cool." JC pushed off from the wall. "You going to stick around and have some lunch? I've got Alyssa coming over later, but …"

Justin was already shaking his head, and the disappointment and the relief made an ugly combination in JC's stomach.

"I can't, man. I'm sorry to say thanks and run, but I've got a paper due at four, and I _really_ need to hit the library."

JC started to say that that was okay, but Justin kept right on going. "Seriously, though, thank you. You are really good. You're going to ace your exams, man, and then I'm going to have to pay you to do that for me. But I have gotta go – I'll catch you at Quinn's, right?"

And then JC was being hugged, and before he could react, Justin was clattering his way down the stairs, and JC's weak 'bye' overlapped with the squeal of the old iron door hinges.

Hanging out with Justin was often a bit of a roller coaster, but this time JC really felt like he'd been run over by one, rather than going around on it.

When he returned to his apartment and let the door swing gently shut behind him the smell of the almond oil was strong, mixed with Justin's deodorant spray, and about a ton of pheromones.

JC scrubbed his hand over his face in an attempt to regain his composure. His skin was soft from the oils, and he could almost catch Justin's scent, worked into his nail beds.

So totally not helping.

JC swallowed, and started to bundle up the towels, but when he used one hand to try and ease the constriction of his jeans, somehow the quick adjustment became a longer stroke, and he was undeniably desperate, however much he wished he wasn't.

Throwing himself face first on his massage couch because that's where Justin had been laying was just too weird, so JC stumbled back the short distance to where his futon had been folded in the corner to make space, and half sat, half fell, with the towels wrapped around his arm, and his other hand fumbling with his buttons. His breath was coming short and fast already, everything focussed on the long-neglected heat of his cock, and the thought of Justin pulling back the towels and stroking his own cock.

His grip was rough, and his hand dry for the first stroke, making JC bite his lip, and in the reality behind his eyelids, Justin was tracing teasing fingers over his own impressive erection. Shuffling on his knees, jeans shoved down around his thighs, to grab the oil bottle that had come to rest on the small tv table, was a momentary interruption, but the smell and the cool slick glide of his palm was well worth it, the sense-memory of Justin's skin echoing when JC shoved one greasy hand up inside his t-shirt to tweak and pull on first one nipple and then the other, urgent to match the slick, slick, slick of his right hand, desperate to draw in as much as possible of the moment before it became too much, before he curled over, silent and breathless and coming in white hot flashes.

The apartment seemed really _quiet_ afterwards, so JC had no option but to listen to his own heavy breathing, and think about just how sleazy that had been. He wiped his sticky hand on his t-shirt, before using the towels to dab at the rest of the mess. The orgasm had been great, but he couldn’t work out how he was going to face Justin in the bar later. Or massage anyone else without remembering what he'd just done.

He hadn't jumped Justin. Point in his favour. But he'd been on his knees jerking off while the towels were still warm, and that didn't make JC feel really good about himself. The desperation, the urgency, disturbed him.

Justin had always been a good friend, and he'd always been really unfazed by JC being queer, but JC couldn't help but wonder how that would change if Justin ever found out that JC had fantasised about him. And not in a casual way. In a kind of scary stalker way.

JC was all in favour of the free expression of affection and admiration, but that normally included his own freedom not to give in to it.  
  
Right.

JC forced himself not to dwell.

Towels and couch-cover into the washer in the basement. Shower. Lunch.

And then to come up with a good reason not to go out and meet the guys later, but to get Chris to come home instead. He really needed to tell his boyfriend about this _after_ a blowjob.

***** fin *****


End file.
